by Walter Blum
A hand waved to him from a booth in the rear. He walked over and sat down. The leather upholstery had a huge gash in the middle, and he had to slide all the way over to make himself comfortable. Despite the warmth of the room, his skin was cold and moist. He could feel his fingers twitching. He had to steady one hand with the other.
He was facing the door, which made him nervous because if anything nasty and dangerous came at him from the rear, he wouldn’t know it was there until the last minute. Sliding into the seat, he had for the first time a good look at the face of the man who had taken over the morning show from him. A bolt of electricity went through him.
“What are you drinking?”
“I don’t drink.”
“Makes no difference. You’ve got to have something with me. I can’t drink alone.”
“Coffee.”
“OK, that’ll do it.”
He stared in disbelief at the apparition sitting opposite him. “How did this happen?” he wanted to know.
“I don’t have time to go into that now. I’m sorry I had to call you out like this. I know you don’t like bars, but it’s the only place I could think of where we wouldn’t be noticed and nobody would know who we are.” He waved to the bartender, a fat, unshaven little man in an ugly crew cut who took his time coming. “Cream and sugar?”
“Yes,” Adam nodded.
It was like being part of a dream. Could it be a dream? The man looked only remotely like Simon Denning. He had lost a great deal of weight, his cheeks were sallow as though he were suffering from some terrible illness, his hair had thinned and his eyes seemed to have receded into the back of his head. But what struck Adam, more than the physical appearance, was the voice. The big, resonant bass voice that was so recognizable to his listeners was no more.
This wasn’t the Simon he remembered. Adam had never known anyone suffering with cancer, but he imagined that’s what it would be like. Certainly, it would account for the ghostly appearance, but when it came time for questions he was afraid to ask. He didn’t know what to say. He wasn’t even sure that this was Simon. Maybe it was an impostor. How could he tell? Since they had never really been friends, he knew of nothing that would force Simon to reveal himself, one way or another. No telltale phrase, no detail from his past or his private life that would say: “I’m the real Simon.”
Well, sooner or later there would be explanations. The bartender returned with beer in a large glass and something oily in a mug. He set a coaster on the table, put the glass on that and walked away. Adam waited. He was not prepared for what came next.
“Adam, about the money—”
“How much do you need?”
“A couple of hundred.”
Adam’s heart did a flip-flop. “I’m sorry,” he said. “You can’t possibly think I carry that much money.”
“Not even a part of it?”
Adam opened his wallet and took out a five-dollar bill. “Here’s everything I have.”
“It’ll do,” Simon said, whipping the bill from him, so fast that it was almost as though, through some peculiar sleight-of-hand, the bill had vanished into thin air.
“Adam, tell me something. Do you consider yourself a good person?”
“I guess so. I never gave it much thought.”
“Good people are hard to find, you know,” said Simon, or the man who looked like him, staring at him with a burning intensity. “Sometimes you have to be tested.”
Suddenly, he was on his feet.
“Where are you going?”
“To the bathroom. Wait for me, don’t go away, I’ll be right back.” He slid out of the booth and was on his way before Adam could object. It seemed as though he was lurching, not the way a drunk does, although in a place like this that would have been understandable, but more like a person who has suffered an injury. Adam was perplexed by the strange gait. He turned just in time to see the door of the men’s room swing closed.
He waited. After a while, two of the men at the bar got up and left, then the woman in the stocking cap took one last sip of her beer and stumbled off into the night. None of them paid. Either they’d already settled their bill or they were “on the tab,” an expression Adam had once heard although he’d never had occasion to use it himself. The fat little bartender came over to the table carrying a beer and asked if his “friend” wanted the same. Only then did he realize that more than ten minutes had passed, and Simon hadn’t returned.
“I’ll see what he wants.”
“Better hurry,” the bartender said. “We’ll be closing soon.”
He went into the men’s room and called out, “Simon?” There were two urinals and a stall for one person to sit down. The walls were green and peeling and, over a period of time, they had been pulled at and scribbled on and the floor was brown with mildew. There was an ugly smell about the room, the result of not being cleaned for so long that the essence of it had sunk in. A single naked bulb hung overhead. A dispenser for paper towels hung on the wall beside the sink, but there were no paper towels in it. There was a dish for soap, but the soap was a filthy gray and the hot water tap did not work.
Although the door to the stall was closed, Adam saw no legs protruding where someone would be seated.
“Simon, you haven’t fallen in, have you?”
He meant it as a joke, but the words had a grim ring, almost as if he believed that’s what had happened. He opened the door to the stall. It was empty. Since there was no window, anyone wanting to leave would have to use the door. Strange. He’d been facing in the direction of the men’s room, and as far as he knew no one had gone in or while out he’d been waiting. But of course he’d been distracted by Simon’s appearance and the drift of the conversations, and also he’d been thinking of Susan, and what he should have said to her at Johnson’s Drug Store that morning, all the witty remarks he could have made, but didn’t.
But why would Simon want to slip out without being seen? He obviously had something he wanted to say, which was why he, Adam, had been called down to the Paradise Lounge in the first place, and now . . .
He stepped out of the men’s room and walked over to the bar. The fat, red-faced little bartender was polishing glasses with a rag that didn’t look too hygienic. The Formica bar top was scratched and stained. “That man I was with.”
“What about him?”
“You didn’t happen to see which way he went, did you?”
The bartender shook his head. “I’ve been in the kitchen.” He gestured toward a door at the far corner of the room. “He could have left while I was in the kitchen.”
“Is there a back door?” The bartender pointed. “So he could have gone out that way without my seeing him.”
“I guess so.”
“Does he come in here regularly?”
“Who?”
“The guy I was with,” Adam said, fighting down his growing impatience.
“Nope. Never saw him before until tonight.” The bartender nodded in the direction of the booth. “Looks like he forgot something.”
Adam went back to the booth. There was a small white envelope wedged behind the Worcestershire sauce bottle and the salt cellar on the table. It might have been there the entire time, and if so, Simon was the only one who could have left it. There was no return address in the corner, and the flap had been sealed. Was it possible, Adam wondered, that he had dozed off between Simon’s sudden departure and the moment he’d gotten up from the table and stepped into the men’s room? If only he’d made a point of checking his watch…but what difference would that have made?
He sat down at the table and picked up the envelope. Something soft rattled inside. He shot a look at the bartender, who shrugged and went back to wiping his glasses. Evidently, the envelope was meant for him. Everyone at the bar had left; there was no one to talk to except the fat man behind the bar. He could shove the envelope in his pocket and go off in search of Simon, but what good would that do? By now he was probably a long way off.
> He tore open the flap of the envelope. Inside was a key, wrapped inside a small piece of paper evidently torn from a notepad, and on the paper three words written in large block letters:
“PAYMENT IN KIND.”
He examined the key from every angle, holding it up to the light. The word “Yale” was inscribed at the top, along with a number. Yale. A company as familiar as Bell Telephone or General Motors. They must have manufactured millions of these keys for people who needed them to open the doors of homes and offices and back rooms. He could spend the rest of his life searching for the right door for this key.
He was beginning to think he’d been made the butt of some elaborate practical joke. He turned his attention to the note. On the back was a series of printed lines, the kind you might find in a weekly diary. The paper was white and ordinary. Had he been a detective, Adam would have dusted it for fingerprints but that sort of thing wasn’t exactly in his line of work. He remembered Simon babbling something about being a good person and being given a test. Was there some connection between that and the note? Or the key?
The whole thing was like some sort of peculiar dream. He’d come down to this sleazy bar in the middle of nowhere, tired, irritable, having put in a long shift at the station, to see a man who vanished as quickly as he appeared. Could Simon, or whoever this guy was, have mistaken him for someone else? Was this the wrong table? No, there was Simon’s drink and his cup of coffee, already growing cold. His wrist was beginning to throb, and he half suspected that the cast, already too tight, might be cutting off his circulation.
He went back to the bartender, whose watery pink eyes and twitchy little nose reminded him oddly of an oversized rabbit, and showed him the note.
“What do you make of this?” he asked.
The bartender, who had been wiping a shot glass, set it down and stared at the note and the rubber band. “Looks to be some sort of receipt, I’d say. You give him money?”
“Yes.”
“I wouldn’t do things like that if I was you, young fella. It’s been my experience that people who give other people money in bars aren’t likely to live long enough to get it back.”
“I don’t expect it back.”
The bartender shrugged. “Well, it’s your nickel. You can do what you like with it. How much you give him?”
“Five dollars.”
The bartender grinned, revealing a generous expanse of toothless mouth. Adam understood now why he seemed to speak without moving his lips. “Y’all been friends for a long time?”
“I hardly knew him.”
“Well, I guess you’re probably better off without him. Didn’t even pay for his drink, did he? That kind’s always on the prowl for handouts. I’d say he figured you for a gift, and from the looks of it he was right.”
“Some gift,” Adam muttered.
“Don’t knock it,” said the bartender. “You can always use a spare key. They come in handy if you’re locked out.”
“Locked out?”
The bartender stared at him, puzzled that he should find it so hard to understand. “Locked out of wherever you are,” he said.
7
The first sign that something was about to happen came two days later on a quiet, almost uneventful evening.
He was in the back room again gathering records for the next day’s show when it occurred. Wally had stopped by to “do a little paper work.” They shared the small space uneasily for a while. Adam’s wrist was still aching from the cast, but when Wally offered at one point to help him pull records down from the shelf, he shook his head testily. The one thing he didn’t want was someone else doing his job for him.
It was slow work. Beside him on the table stood the record rack and a pad of paper, on which he kept track of what would be played. There were about 50 songs that people wanted to hear, plus a few specialty numbers. By carefully selecting what would go on the turntables, each song would get at least one play without being repeated. Next day, he would transfer the contents of the pad into the daily play list.
Wally sat down next to Adam. Although he was only three years older, he affected the air of a wise elder statesman compelled to lead his young colleague through the brambles of foolishness. “Listen, Adam, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. You’ve got to start thinking seriously about your future. You can’t sit around all night playing love songs and making up words that don’t make any sense. You’ve got to have a reason for living.”
“How’s your deal coming?” Adam asked. He pulled down a copy of Nature Boy and set it so the jacket covered the sheet of paper he’d been writing on.
Wally apparently hadn’t noticed. Once his ego had been rubbed up, he glowed like a firefly that had blossomed into something the size of a lighthouse. Wally knew his priorities. When it came to business, everything else dwindled by comparison. “This thing will be the making of me,” he said. “I just wish I could let you come aboard, but the book is closed. Maybe later, if you have a few dollars to spare.”
Adam couldn’t help kidding his pompous colleague. “You’re not going to tell me what it’s about?” he said.
“Sorry. Can’t say a word until it’s signed, sealed and delivered. That’s where you and I are different, buddy boy. In this business, you’ve got to keep everything under your belt—which is no reflection on our friendship, but when it’s something this big, you learn not to trust anyone. No matter how close they are. You get my drift?”
Adam smiled inwardly. He had caught something in Wally’s voice, or his demeanor, or perhaps just his presence—something indefinable but as real as the microphone that would soon be extending itself to serve his needs. For the first time, he felt like telling Wally to take a flying leap. The clarity of his understanding was awesome, but he decided it would be better for both of them if he said nothing, at least for the time being.
Wally finally finished his “paper work,” lumbered to his feet and disappeared into the night, to Adam’s infinite relief. Before long, he was back in the control room, setting up the turntables for his show so he wouldn’t have to rush at the last minute. It would take a while to get the bad taste of Wally out of his mouth, although tonight his mood was such that he could almost tolerate the disagreeable sales manager.
He was a good twenty minutes into the show when the first call came in.
“Mr. Bay-ul?”
A familiar voice. The sound of it brought him back to life, back to the room at the top of the stairs. This he knew, this he could understand.
He put himself into a mood that enveloped the tower. Rain had fallen most of the day, and the gray sandstone was dripping with moisture. The cracks between them had taken on a greenish coat. You could feel the wetness creeping around corners as it tingled the back of your neck. Coming up here, he’d noticed how wet and slippery the steps had become, the ones leading up the inside of the tower. A wet screen mixed with grime had formed on the window halfway up the stairs. On any ordinary night, that window would have let in a sliver of moonlight to see by, but there was no moon tonight, just clouds and dampness and a dank chill. He loved inventing scenarios for his nightly fantasia.
“Mr. Bay-ul, would you play a song for me?”
Yes, indeed, this was where he belonged. The record he would need—she rarely asked for anything else—was barely six inches from his fingers. Now he was on track again. He would cue up the record, then get to his feet, walk to the back of the room and pour himself a cup of coffee.
Usually it didn’t occur to him to wonder why the pot was always filled, why the water stood bubbling and ready. But tonight it did. Everything stood out with an urgency that could not be ignored. The coffee stung his throat. He looked out the window. The mist had parted, and suddenly the airplane that he had only imagined now appeared as part of the scene, its lights growing in size. He could see the wings and even the pilot’s face as he peered from the cockpit, and it was coming toward him.
He closed his eyes. When he opened them again
, the lights were gone, the mist had closed in and Doris Day was singing Secret Love on Turntable Number Two.
***
As so often happened in mid-afternoon, he had the B&B Cafe to himself. He was looking forward to a quiet half hour or more with a novel he’d bought for a quarter at a used book store in Forest Glen, a 19th century English romance filled with glittering costumes, glorious scenery, dialogue that scintillated and practically no sex. The author was someone he’d never heard of, a man named John Thornton. The setting was a country estate where deer roamed and elaborate gardens were cultivated. The heroine had just rolled up in her carriage for a visit when Adam became aware of a shadow falling across his page.
“You’ve got good taste, young man,” said the fat gentleman in the navy blue suit. “Mind if I join you?”
“Please,” Adam gestured at the seat opposite him. He was too polite to refuse, although he would have preferred having the rest of the afternoon to himself.
“Jack Shapiro.”
“Hello.”
The man eased into his chair and extended a fleshy hand in his direction. “We met at the country club.”
“The undertaker.”
Shapiro smiled. “I’m happy to see you remember me. Mr. Goldman and I had a little talk the other day, and he suggested I speak to you again about joining the club. You may not be aware of it, but many of the young single men are leaving for big cities up north, where the jobs pay more. That makes for an uncomfortable ratio of women to men, which is not good for the social well-being of a country club like the Fairmount.”
“I’d join if I could afford it,” Adam said.
Shapiro made a face. “Well, we might arrange a scholarship if money’s the problem. I’ll be happy to put your name up for membership. In the meantime, you’re welcome to use the facilities.” He pointed to Adam’s plate. “I see you’re almost finished. How about if I take care of the bill for you?”